Richard Wagner and King Ludwig II, which resulted in massive development in the form of "modernising" German Romantic music well ahead of archconservative Johannes Brahms and his supporters.

 

Yep!

And Mozart with da Ponte

And Puccini with Luigi Illica and Giuseppe Giacosa

 

Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears.

 

They were gay lovers.

 

No one has mentioned this yet I don't think, so what about John Eliot Gardiner and all Baroque and Classical music.

 

A few others that come to mind:

Dutoit and Argerich
Handel and Senesino
Mozart and Da Ponte
Mozart and Leutgeb
Mozart and Stadler
Rostropovich and Vishnevskaya
Sibelius and Kajanus
Sutherland and Bonynge
John Tavener and Patricia Rosario
Verdi and Piave

 

R. Strauss and Hofmannsthal

 

Stravinsky and the ballet impresario Sergei Diaghilev of the Ballets Russes - producing three ballets central to the 20th century repertoire. I don't even have to name them, you all know them!

Yes: Pulcinella, Agon and Apollo.

 

Shostakovich and Stalin

 

Bach and his sons.

 

Florestan and Eusebius

 

I might get some tomatoes thrown for this, but John Cage, Merce Cunningham, and David Tudor were a great combination. Especially David Tudor for the way he took the strange music handed to him, sometimes only graphs, and realizing them into actual pieces.

 

Kondrashin and Shostakovich

 

In later years, yes, but never as intensely as Mravinsky and Shostakovich until Mravinsky refused to conduct the potentially controversial premiere of Shostakovich's 13th Symphony in 1962 (which is where Kondrashin comes in). The relationship between Mravinsky and Shostakovich was forever spoiled after that.

 

Tchaikovsky and Nadezhda von Meck. Although this wasn't an artistic collaboration it was probably only her financial backing and their correspondence that prevented him becoming both unhinged and poverty-stricken during the fallout of his disastrous marriage, thus enabling him to continue composing.

 

Maxim Vengerov and Daniel Barenboim

 

These dudes:

 

Since I've been getting into musicals again lately, there have been some great partnerships in those:
- Rodgers and Hammerstein - producing musicals like Oklahoma!, The King and I, The Sound of Music and others.
- Andrew Lloyd Webber & Tim Rice -Joseph and the amazing technicolour dreamcoat, Jesus Christ Superstar and Evita

Re patrons, I see them as not really partners but just people who fund composers. I think the biggest partnership Wagner had was with himself, seriously (eg. he wrote his own librettos). But of course his relationship with Ludwig - as was Tchaikovsky's to von Meck - where very important aspects of their lives as a whole. Without them, it would have been a very different story indeed.

Similar with musicians who focus on a dead composer's music. I see it as a different issue, but people are free to put on this thread what they think is relevant.

 

Dietrich Fischer Dieskau and Gerald Moore!

Franz Schubert and Michael Vogl!

 

Some others I like:

Italian composer Berio and his wife Cathy Berberian (her amazing vocal range inspired him to no end)

Janacek and Rudolf Firkusny - the young pianist studied under the ageing composer, and Firkusny became one of the finest interpreters of his piano music. Not strictly a 'partnership' - Janacek did not write his works for Firkusny - but I think given this teacher-student connection, there's a similar vibe in that.

Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht - they collaborated on a number of works, eg. the Berliner Requiem and the Threepenny Opera. The rise of the Nazis and the war split them up, Weill went to the USA and Brecht sat out the war in Sweden. Their biting social satire and political commentary was influential in many ways, not only in classical music but in the wider popular culture.

Edith Piaf and Margeurite Monnot, writing some of the greatest French chansons of the early to mid 20th century. Its hard to disentangle what they did sometimes, they worked as a really tight unit.

 

Jacqueline du Pre and Daniel Barenboim

Sviatoslav Richter, David Oistrakh, and Mstislav Rostropovich

 

Rogers and Hart, Lerner and Lowe, Gilbert and Sulivan. Wagner and Matilda Wessendonk, Grieg and Ibsen,

 

Don't know any off the top of my head so I'll just say ComposerOfAvantGarde and MaestroViolinist.

 

Monteverdi and Zappa.

 

Which Zappa?

 

Lyapunov and Balakirev.

 

Morecambe & Wise

 

Joan Sutherland and Richard Bonynge although it is hard to say who benefitted most.

 

Not exactly classical I know, but how about Ellington and Strayhorn?